by Eva Dolan
Her parents’ house stood separated from the village green by the narrowest of roads. A stone and thatch cottage five hundred years old, long and low and resolutely solid. It had been a bakehouse once, derelict when they bought it soon after their marriage, but carefully restored before she was born, her mother only a couple of years older than she was now. Ella struggled to imagine living a life that sensible and settled at such a young age. But she knew her mother couldn’t understand the choices she’d made either.
The gates were open and they pulled along the gravel driveway up to the open barn at the back of the house, where her father’s bashed-up Defender was parked, alongside the peppermint-green Alvis he’d started to restore when he retired. He didn’t seem to be making any progress on it and Ella wondered if he’d got bored, or distracted by other things. Her mother had let slip that he was doing consultancy work now, but wouldn’t go into details, insisting it was hellishly tedious and she never listened when he talked about it.
Ella was convinced her mother just didn’t trust her to know what he was working on or who for.
Ever since the last arrest Ella had noticed she didn’t ask what she was doing any more. Not when she phoned or emailed, not even during the half-hour car journey from the station. Ella decided she wouldn’t mention anything herself, see how her mother managed to avoid the subject for three days.
It would be nice to ignore it herself for a while, too. She’d hoped her release without charge would be an end to the speculation, but it hadn’t slowed down the gossip or convinced people who thought she was involved that she hadn’t been. Never mind that she had an alibi and absolutely no reason to get tangled up in something so senselessly destructive as arson.
Regardless of how hard she protested, it fitted certain people’s idea of who Ella Riordan was, added a layer of ‘dangerous allure’. Someone had said that, right to her face. A man, naturally.
So, if her mother wanted to talk about other things, that was fine.
In the house Ella dropped her bag and went straight to the postbox-red range, more from habit than a need for warmth. The kitchen was fully decked for Christmas, garlands of pine cones hanging from the beams, smelling of cinnamon and the orange peel her mother would have dried herself at the beginning of the month. In the far corner a short but dense tree was strung with the same old red and white decorations, lights twinkling in the foliage.
Ella gasped, remembering how thoughtlessly she’d thrown her bag down, and rushed over to find the package she’d brought, pulling out clothes and books and the other presents she’d carefully wrapped back in her flat. She stopped when she found the small purple box and handed it to her mother.
‘I hope it’s not broken.’
‘Ooh, Liberty.’ She opened the box and lifted out the mercifully intact bauble, a warm smile spreading across her face. ‘It’s perfect, Ellie. Beautiful. Thank you so much. Do you want to put it on the tree?’
Ella took the delicate red-and-white candy-striped decoration and found a space for it at the front of the tree, between a gingerbread man and a felt stag.
‘Coffee?’ her mother asked, as she hung up her overcoat in the boot room. ‘Or would you like one of my special hot chocolates?’
‘Have you got marshmallows?’
‘I’m insulted you need to ask.’ She started on their drinks while Ella sat down at the long oak table and they talked about the charity work her mother had been doing, making up hampers to give out at a food bank in Newcastle. ‘Nobody should have to have a sad Christmas.’
That jolted Ella back to Castle Rise, the nine families still remaining, who would be enduring rather than enjoying their break, knowing that the trees they’d put up would not see another year in the same place, that the orders to quit might arrive before Twelfth Night.
Ella had bought them each gifts, only small things, but it seemed important to do so; biscuits in pretty tins and coffee liqueur, hot-water bottles with knitted covers and Lego kits for the kids. She stopped off there yesterday evening, late, so they wouldn’t feel pressured into reciprocating.
Molly had already bought her something. Or, rather, not bought, Ella realised when she opened the package to find a signed first edition of Nights at the Circus, well-thumbed and a little battered around the edges, but worth a stupid amount, Ella suspected. Not that she’d ever sell it.
‘I can’t accept this,’ she’d said. ‘It’s too much.’
Molly had waved away her half-hearted protest. ‘Please, who else am I going to leave it to?’
It wasn’t until she was on the Tube home that the strangeness of Molly’s words struck her. Was there something wrong with her? It would explain the expression on Molly’s face when Ella told her she was going home for the holidays, a look of piercing disappointment. Molly had told her before that she was welcome to come over for a couple of days if she was on her own in London, tossed it out casually even though it clearly wasn’t. Christmas was tough when you had no one, Ella thought, but Molly didn’t seem the type to be bothered by that ordinarily and she would have Callum with her; two lost souls, improbably clinging to one another.
But what if he was going to his family?
The idea of Molly alone in the flat was heartbreaking. The absolute, crushing sadness of it. Ella prayed that Callum wasn’t going away. She wanted him to surprise Molly with an extravagant breakfast on the day or turn up with a tree on Christmas Eve and coax her into decorating it with him. That they’d do something to alleviate the recent grim monotony of life at Castle Rise.
Ella finished the last of her hot chocolate, realising how heavily her mother had spiked it with amaretto. Her face felt flushed and she smiled.
‘That was extra special, wasn’t it, Mum?’
She shrugged, innocent-looking. ‘Well, it is Christmas.’
‘I think I need a lie-down after that.’
‘Go on, I’ll wake you for supper.’
Ella started towards her bag, its contents strewn on the flagstones around it.
‘I’ll take care of your things,’ her mother said. ‘You go up, darling.’
Opening the door to her childhood bedroom provoked a moment of sharp dislocation. Only now did she remember the conversation about redecorating. Everything would be carefully put away in the attic, her mother had reassured her, and Ella didn’t doubt it was all up there, but this gilt and mahogany boutique-hotel interior was going to take a little getting used to.
The bed was more comfortable than her old one, though, and she fell asleep within a few minutes, lulled by the familiar sound of the back boiler heating the house.
When she woke up again the curtains had been drawn and a woollen throw placed over her and she could hear voices downstairs she recognised as her brother and his wife. Ella groaned into the lavender-scented pillow. She’d hoped to avoid them until lunch tomorrow but of course they were here now, ready for the short walk across the green to midnight mass. Another Riordan family tradition she could have done without.
She delayed the inevitable for a little longer, took a shower and washed her hair, seeing under the en suite’s brilliant lighting how tired she looked. That was more than one night’s bad sleep and an early morning, it was everything – her PhD and her campaigning, all the worry and responsibility, the clutching fear that kept her awake into the early hours – all of that piling up on her. Ella swept tinted moisturiser on to her damp skin, added a quick flick of liquid liner, and she looked almost ready to face her family.
As she was getting dressed she heard a mobile phone ring in the next room, her father answering – ‘It’s Christmas Eve, can this not wait?’ And apparently it could because by the time she was in the hallway, he’d fallen silent again.
The door to his study was half open and she saw him sitting at his old captain’s desk under the window, a brass lamp casting the only light in the oxblood room, throwing his shadow across the wall where his photo gallery hung. She had stood here a thousand times, waiting to go in, an
d the scene hadn’t changed since she was small; her dad, straight-backed and broad-shouldered, although she’d swear his steel-grey hair had thinned a little more at the crown since the last time she saw him. He’d come to Edinburgh during the festival and taken her to lunch at a restaurant near the station, which he’d seen favourably reviewed in the Telegraph. She’d called him from her hotel room in a panic that morning and he’d caught the next train, calmed her down, talked the sense she needed to hear even though she didn’t want him to be right.
‘Don’t stand on ceremony, Ellie love.’
He spun away from his desk and Ella walked into an enveloping hug. He smelled of woodsmoke and old wool, reassuringly unchanged, as he kissed the top of her head. When she stepped back he looked her over and nodded.
‘Yes, there’s my little firebrand.’
‘Dad, please. . .’
He chuckled and went over to the space on his crowded bookshelf where he kept a few bottles of Scotch, poured two measures, while she curled up in his leather wing chair. There was a book splayed on the arm, a dry-looking exploration of Middle Eastern geopolitics. He picked it up when he handed over her drink and went to close the study door before returning to his seat at the desk. She’d hoped this might wait until Boxing Day but her father wasn’t the kind of man to put things off. And, she supposed, he was worried too.
Ella sipped the Scotch, knew it was a good one but not why; they all tasted the same to her.
‘I’m fine,’ she said, before he could ask. ‘It all got sorted.’
‘And that’s an end to it?’
‘I hope so.’
‘You don’t sound very certain,’ he said. ‘And you don’t look confident. I’m your father: you can’t hide from me.’
She looked away from him, towards the photographs on his wall where he posed with local politicians and councillors in his dress uniform, all smiles and friendly handshakes. In this light you couldn’t see how strained some of the expressions were – sometimes his, sometimes theirs, depending on what had happened in the run-up to the photo opportunity. The only one where he looked like her dad rather than ACC Alec Riordan was taken with some old Newcastle United player at a charity golf match.
‘You’re treading a dangerous line, Ellie.’
She glared at him. ‘I know what I’m doing. I’m not a child.’
‘You’re my child, no matter how old you are and how clever you are. And I’m fully entitled to worry about what you’re doing with your life.’
There it was.
‘I’m not going to stop just because you disapprove,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry, Dad, I know this isn’t what you wanted me to do with my life but it’s important work. And,’ – she threw her hands up – ‘most people don’t care. They wouldn’t want to do it, but somebody has to.’
‘It doesn’t have to be you.’
‘I’m good at this.’ She hated the desperation in her voice right then; a little girl wanting Daddy’s approval. ‘Dad, I’m making so much progress.’
‘At what cost?’ he asked quietly, looking down into his drink. ‘Would you have gone to prison for this?’
‘It didn’t come to that.’
‘Because you were lucky.’ He nodded at her. ‘This time, you got lucky. But what about next time?’
‘I’m not going to do anything stupid,’ Ella told him, deflated by the conversation, wishing he could have just told her how proud he was, that even if he didn’t agree he could appreciate how hard she was working.
He drained his drink. ‘You know we’ll always be here for you, don’t you? If things start to go too far, you only have to call me.’
And then where would she be? Reputation shot, friends scattered, she’d be exactly what her detractors always thought she was: a copper’s daughter playing at rebellion to make a point.
No, she’d worked too hard for that. Nothing would ever induce her to use his connections.
But it was Christmas and he’d had his say and there was no reason to argue with him.
‘I appreciate that, Dad,’ she said, reaching to squeeze his hand. ‘Thank you.’
Molly
Now – 13th March
I haven’t slept.
Not even a brief nap last night and now I’m having palpitations at my desk while I bury myself in denial, working through the last couple of weeks’ photographs, deciding which ones are good enough to put up on the image banks that keep me in pappy white bread and instant coffee and these dodgy Marlboro I buy under the counter, dirt cheap and tax free.
Ella knew him.
OK, she told me that – her tepid one-night stand; she was entitled to lie about it, I suppose – but she said she hadn’t seen him at the party. Why lie about that?
I get up from my desk and pace around the living room, taking deep, sandpapery drags, blowing the smoke out slowly. Back and forth, ash flaking on to the garish carpet I’d always meant to get rid of but gradually came to love for its clashing colours and the pattern so hideous it was almost beautiful.
Doesn’t Ella trust me?
Is that it?
Once again I switch to the tab where the incriminating photograph is blown up as large as its resolution will allow. Ella’s back is to the camera, her shoulders straight with tension, but this is a millisecond captured and frozen and I know better than to read her entire mood into what might have been a quick shrug.
He’s leaning towards her in the photo. Most of his face infuriatingly hidden from the lens. I have enough to know it’s definitely him but not enough to judge his mood or behaviour. This is the only image I can find and it tells me nothing.
I get rid of the picture, bring up something sedate to work on for a while. A Georgian front door, weathered and scuffed, its paint faded, ironwork rusted. These photos sell well. Doorways and alleyways, old staircases and stone steps. People can’t resist them, the allure of secrets hidden and opportunities waiting.
People get killed in alleyways, that’s what I know. Beaten or raped. Nothing good ever happened to anyone behind a door that looks like that.
And Ella doesn’t trust me.
It’s a physical pain like my ribs are closing in around my heart and lungs. She made me her accomplice, knowing I’d help her even at the risk of my own freedom. She knows how deep my loyalty runs. This isn’t the first time I’ve shown her that.
I want things to be as they were a week ago, when we were sisters in arms, fighting the good fight. Ella accomplishing things I don’t have the youth or energy to get done, taking my advice, learning from my mistakes. Half the contacts she’s built her reputation on are mine. I’ve vouched for her to people who wouldn’t have trusted her with their surnames, let alone anything more. A copper’s daughter. An assistant chief constable’s daughter, for Christ’s sake.
Is she keeping things from me because she’s planning on going to him for help?
The less I know the more difficult for me to contradict whatever story he cooks up to get her off the hook. . .
But I can’t see that happening. Not knowing what I know about their relationship. Going to her father now would confirm every bad thing he believes about her. It would put her at his mercy. She’s run this far from his iron grip, betraying everything he stands for along the way, dragging his profession through the dirt; I can’t see her running back to him.
I take a deep breath, my hand pressed to my heart, feeling every beat hit my palm. Try to calm down, try to think.
My eye catches on the ugly steel rat trap Callum brought up yesterday evening. It’s behind the sofa, laid along the skirting board. That’s where you catch them, Callum says. They burrow into the upholstery, tear clumps out to take back to their nests, and they run along the wall, straight into the traps.
Rats are smarter than that, though, I’m sure.
He’s baited it with half a chocolate Pop-Tart but it’s still a trap and rats haven’t survived this long with the whole of human ingenuity railed against them by falling for such cheap tr
icks.
I grab my mobile and call Ella.
It goes straight through to voicemail but I don’t leave a message. Her Twitter account shows no activity beyond a few links to news items and petitions she’s encouraging her followers to sign; one to boycott the raising of a statue dedicated to an Edwardian philanthropist and espouser of eugenics, another calling for the support of a local library being threatened with closure.
I send her a text. Telling her I need her opinion on the latest batch of photos for her book.
She’ll realise it’s a lie, but you never know who else will see these messages.
I check on the other traps Callum has laid, one behind the fridge and another behind the toilet, the last hidden in the airing cupboard, where the rats have been rootling around, leaving scratch marks on the chipboard and gnawing at the lagging on the pipes. That’s where he’ll catch one if he’s going to.
Thinking of snapped bones and sprayed blood, I remove the clothes hanging from the lowest shelf, a lambswool jumper I bought from Help the Aged and a vintage silk blouse I’ve had since the seventies, printed with tiny tulips, and put them on the radiator. Two generations I’ve owned that blouse and I can still remember the song that was playing in the changing room when I tried it on – Roxy Music, ‘Both Ends Burning’.
Time isn’t supposed to move this fast.
I go back to my desk, stick my earphones in and turn the volume up on an instrumental playlist heavy on the Afro-Cuban funk, forcing myself to concentrate on the photographs that still need editing.
At my back the photographs I took in my prime watch over me, and when I’m doing this kind of work I feel judged by them. Protestors and club kids, gangsters and rent boys and musicians long gone to obscurity. People whose personalities burned so hot through the lens they could have singed my eyelashes.
